Diego Garcia, lead singer of the breaking band Elefant, was confident before taking the stage for sound check at the 9:30 club on Saturday.
"Right now people don't really know us, so you'll see tonight, it starts off very cold. It starts off at one temperature and hopefully just heats up, and by the end of the show I think we've got more fans," he said.
To tell the truth, by the end of Elefant's performance the room felt a lot warmer.
One of many fresh-faced, captivating groups to overflow "lake music's" New York City tributaries and make the big splash, Elefant is on its first nationwide tour supporting "Sunlight Makes Me Paranoid," an ode to everything Black Francis and Robert Smith.
Fronted by Garcia, who far and away has the award for most charismatic and alluring front man in the scene - tall, dark, handsome and sporting an Antonio Banderas accent - Elefant is set on a sojourn and not just a tour.
"It's all about long term here. I'm not just making this record for one tour, and that's it, I'm not going to go get a job tomorrow," said Garcia. "This is what I do with my life. I'm going to be writing songs forever. And I guess it's a long road and we'll see what happens after the next record."
For Garcia, music comes first. He's not a bling-bling rock star; he's a Skynyrd-esque "Simple Man" of words from the heart.
"Ultimately, I think [image] doesn't matter," said Garcia. "I mean if you have good songs you can do anything. If I didn't have good songs I think people would hate me, period."
The importance of music over image also came up in reference to the new Outkast album [See The Eagle's Sept. 25 review]. The double album allowed listeners to juxtapose emcee Big Boi's focus on standard-fare hip-hop with Andre 3000's funk approach to hip-hop.
"I think it's refreshing that they finally started being honest ... hip-hop got boring," said Garcia. "They started doing something that's just a little more musical; it's full of life, it's fresh, and God bless them."
Garcia plans to continue focusing on the sound and the lyrics, not the gimmicks.
"I think we're getting a lot of attention because the music is good," he said.
Concluding a tour with Interpol at the 9:30 club on Saturday, Elefant, along with openers The Occasion, symbolized something greater than just good music.
The pairing of these three bands embodied what Garcia described as a necessary kinship.
"We're doing music in a time when everybody said it was dead ... we need that kinship to survive," said Garcia. "I need them to do well. I need The Strokes' record ["Room Of Fire," which comes out Oct. 21] to sell well. It's important for good music that we all do well and support each other ... It's all positively correlated."
True to his words, Garcia and the rest of Elefant, Mod on guitar, James Berrall on bass and Kevin McAdams on drums, finished its set with a rousing edition of "Bokkie," featuring backup percussion and vocals from the entire cast of The Occasion, making this kinship real.
